Monday, August 1, 2011
'My poor gentle boy is locked up 23 hours a day and offered pick-pocketing lessons,' tweets Gilmour's mother
Posted by org at 11:42 PMStudent rioter Charlie Gilmour is being locked up for 23 hours a day, according to his mother.
Novelist Polly Samson also says he has been offered pick-pocketing lessons by another prisoner.
Miss Samson, 49, who is married to Pink Floyd guitarist Dave Gilmour, was devastated when her son was jailed for 16 months after showing the ‘ultimate disrespect’ to Britain’s war dead by swinging from the flag on the Cenotaph.
Support: Polly Samson and her son Charlie Gilmour on their way to court
A court heard the Cambridge history undergraduate was ‘out of his mind’ on a cocktail of LSD, Valium and whisky when he also attacked Prince Charles’s convoy during the tuition fee protests in London last December.
Gilmour, 21, was sent to Wandsworth Prison last month after admitting violent disorder. His parents are considering an appeal against the length of his sentence – which has triggered a debate over its apparent severity relative to the soft punishments often handed out for far worse offences.
Miss Samson has been posting messages on the Twitter networking site about her son, saying she is ‘so proud’ of him and calling his sentence ‘bonkers’.
She has also told how she had been bombarded with hate mail sent to her home.
Writing on Twitter, she noted: ‘Letter from son still locked in 23 hours a day.
'Pickpocket has offered tutelage but shortage of pockets on prison uniforms.
‘He seems to be coping remarkably well despite being locked in 23 hours a day.’
Responding to messages of support, she agreed with one Twitter user who wrote: ‘Poor lad should have worn a balaclava, 16 months for protesting.’
Miss Samson replied: ‘I would advise anyone who’s thinking of protesting to wear [a balaclava]. Is so unfair that only one side gets to wear armour.’
Miss Samson then added: ‘This generation will be so alienated and they’re the ones who will be paying for our dotage.’ Yesterday she said hate mail has been sent to the home she shares with Dave Gilmour, 65, and their other sons Joe, 16, Gabriel, 14 and daughter Romany, nine. Mr Gilmour has four children from a previous marriage.
The family have a home in London and a £2.6million seafront mansion in Hove, East Sussex.
Protest: Charlie Gilmour was jailed for 16 months after admitting violent disorder
Miss Samson wrote: ‘Receiving hate mail is such a bad start to the day.’
When asked why she had been targeted, she said: ‘Apparently for accompanying my son to court instead of having him aborted 21 years ago.’
Charlie is said to have gone on a drink and drugs binge after being rejected by his natural father, poet Heathcote Williams. Williams had an affair with Miss Samson which led to the birth of Charlie, who was adopted by Mr Gilmour.
Friends of the curly-haired student said he and Williams had an initial reunion last summer, but that in November Williams sent Charlie an email saying he was cutting his son out of his life and leaving Charlie ‘devastated’.
At the time of his sentencing on July 15, Miss Samson wrote: ‘Just about everything about him makes him perfect to use as an example.
‘It does seem that student protesters are more of a scourge than paedophile gang rapists.’
A report last year revealed that around a quarter of sex offenders who prey on children are let off with a caution and do not even see the inside of a court.
Wandsworth jail in south London holds 1,600 inmates, including violent thugs and rapists. It is classed as a category B prison, the second most secure level.
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